Students suspended for viewing web porn

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The NSW education department said today it was testing a new
internet filtering system, as three high school students were
suspended for looking up pornographic images on school
computers.

The three 14-year-old Year 8 students from Elderslie High School
at Narellan, in Sydney's south west, were given a "short term"
suspension on Friday after a teacher caught them accessing
pornographic websites in the school's computer room.

"The students were caught by teachers who were apparently
monitoring what was going on and saw all the kids crowding around
the computer and sprung them," an education department spokesman
said.

"I guess it probably happens from time to time but this is the
first one I have heard of for a while.

"And bear in mind the number of kids we have got in our schools,
it is quite a minority."

The spokesman said a centralised filtering system was in place
in NSW schools but the blocks did not necessarily filter out all
overseas web sites.

He said a new superior system was currently being trialled as
part of an $84 million plan to tighten internet security.

The new system involves giving students an individual electronic
learning account with their own email address.

The education department spokesman said increased security would
ensure that inappropriate internet sites were blocked, bad language
use stopped and teachers could monitor chat rooms.

"The e-learning accounts have been trialled in a couple of
schools and they are to be rolled out statewide," he said.

The date for the completed rollout was not yet available, the
spokesman said.